


An Inability to Understand

by tea_rex



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Doctor Who AU, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-04
Updated: 2017-08-04
Packaged: 2018-12-11 05:46:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11708052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tea_rex/pseuds/tea_rex
Summary: It's not that she doesn’t want him to sweep her off her feet. She does. Really.





	An Inability to Understand

**Author's Note:**

> halp
> 
> not betaed

 

It's not that she doesn’t want him to sweep her off her feet. She does. Really. 

 

...but it'd be nice to be still for a couple seconds. Get a little R&R in. Purposefully cuddle up to him, not just cause they’re running away from the police and have to hide in a rather cramped alleyway or cause he didn’t know when they locked the doors of the observatory and they'd been trapped. The low that night had been -5 degrees.

 

=======================

 

“…oh”

 

She can’t believe she had the guts to bring it up. It's so characteristically _him_  that she can’t believe that he’d ever be able, or even want to, change. 

 

“it's not a…bad thing…?”

 

“okay”

 

“Doctor, it's just I… I've slept ten hours in the past four days”

 

“sorry”

 

“and I, I just, I _need_  to sleep” 

She’s not kidding. She hadn’t been able to sleep that night in the observatory. She and the Doctor stayed awake the entire time, him encouraging her with, quite frankly, annoying phrases: “just remember, pain is temporary, pride is forever”, “push-ups are _good for you_ , Rose”. She had been about to remind him that boxing would also warm her up. 

 

Not only that, but she hadn’t had any of her school work, and she’s still playing catch-up in her classes, making up for a terrifying night and a terrifying morning, when a security guard nearly killed them after they ran into him after racing down the hallways(“to warm us up, Rose!”). She still hasn’t promised the Doctor that she won’t tell her mother about it. 

 

“Right! Well then we’d better get you home! You can go to sleep straight away, and I’ll wake you up in approximately, ehm, assuming you want to make up for about eight hours of sleep every night, twenty-four hours.”

 

With that he’s beckoning her out of the café, looping an arm around her waist, making her hyper-aware of her body and the way that he casually maneuvers her. They’re walking towards her flat when she realizes whats happened. 

 

“Doctor!”

 

“mhmm” He doesn’t stop, and peers carefully both ways before guiding them across a street.

In a move that will amaze her later, she spins towards him, grabs his lapels, and pushes him up against a wall. She has no excuses except that she’s fairly sleep deprived, and pinning the Doctor to the wall seems like a reasonable action to take to get him to stop moving. 

 

“you’re doing it. _Again_.” 

“doing what!?”

“Moving. fast.” He stares at her, moving his hands up to grasp her shoulders. Even this small motion, innocent compared to her position, bothers her. He touches her _all the time_. And he doesn’t notice. 

“I, well, yes! But only because you said you were tired, and it's Friday, and you don’t have any classes, and you don’t have anything due tonight, and you don’t have anything to do tonight, and-"

“I-“ she interrupts him, “-am not yours”

 

His hands tighten on her shoulders. She’s fairly sure he’s not breathing.

 

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

“Of course I do. You, Rose Tyler, are a strong and independent woman who don’t need no man” He grins, trying to diffuse the tension, but there’s something off about it. She’s not to be distracted, however.

“you” she stabs him in the chest with an accusing finger “know so much about me”

“is, erm, is that a problem?”

“no, of course not. But I know so little about you. Why do you stay at school over the holidays? Where are you from? Where is your family? What _are_  we?”

He clenches his jaw but makes no move to answer. The steady weight of his hands disappear. 

“Oh jeez, oh shite, Doctor I, I didn’t mean any of that. I don’t wanna force you to tell me anything, it's just, I haven’t got much sleep, and…” She’s trembling with the shame of interrogating him. His face, normally so open and enthusiastic, has closed off, and she knows that it's cause she’s gone too far. The Doctor's lines are obvious, and she just crossed all of them. 

_shite, bloody fucking hell. fuck._  She’s taking off before she can think better of it, running. Away from him. She needs to recuperate. Sleep a good 24 hours or whatever the Doctor said. She’s vaguely aware of the Doctor trailing her, shouting her name, but she’s always been a better sprinter than he, and she makes it inside her apartment building and slams the door before he can put his stupid foot in it, literally.

 

“ROSE!” as if she’ll ignore him. She can never ignore him. 

“Doctor”

“Oh, you’re right there. good. ehm, Rose, can you open the door? It's a tad inconvenient to not be able to see you while talking to you.”

“no”

“…ok. Rose, are you...okay?”

“no”

“can I please come in?”

“no”

“Rose” He’s practically whining now, and she knows that he knows that she knows that if she opens the door and sees his stupid cute puppy face that she’ll cave. 

“bye Doctor.”

“Rose!”

 

She can hear his various pleadings behind her as she trudges up the stairs. _fuck him. fuck him and his stupid perfect grades. His perfect social skills. His inability to open up. fuck him._


End file.
